Becoming Human
by Cuppa Char
Summary: 3x24 canon divergence: Void Stiles starts to heal from the stabbing before the fly left and didn't die. Now he's human and in need of the packs help, much to Stiles chagrin. But this is as much about Stiles recovery as it is the void's.


A/N: Partly inspired by my Scott's Pet Project head canon over at my tumblr (cuppachar) but more angsty.

Immediately post 3x24 Divine Move

This actually started out as some drabbles on my tumblr over the last few days and kind of snow-balled from there. This is those drabbles all in one place. Apart from the start this chapter is mostly the voids pov but the next chapter will be from Stiles and entitled 'Being Human'...

T/Warnings: Dark thoughts, implied suicidal thoughts.

Disclaimer: Standard disclaimers apply. No infringement intended. Teen Wolf and characters are not mine.

xxx

* * *

Stiles eyes blink open slowly. Lydia and Kira are hunched over him, faces worn with worry and concern.

"I fainted, didn't I?" he asks, voice scratchy in his throat. His eyes search sluggishly for Scott but all he can see is Isaac's long legs that block his view. "Where's Scott?" he asks, voice rising in panic.

"I'm here," he hears. "I'm fine."

"We're alive?" Stiles asks in disbelief, sagging back to the floor in exhaustion, eyes and cheekbones and everything else hurting all at once. "We're all alive?"

"We're alive," Scott confirms and he wonders why Scott sounds the way he does. Voice stilted, distracted.

"What?" he asks, pushing himself up and waving Lydia's protesting arms away from him. She moves reluctantly and Isaac steps aside revealing Scott leaning over another body.

Another him.

Another Stiles.

Void.

The nogitsune.

"What are you doing?" Stiles asks, voice high in panic. He feels confusion and terror spike, automatically latching onto Lydia's arm as she rounds into him, tightening her hold and squeezing him tight.

Scott isn't just leaning over a prone form. He's performing CPR.

"Scott!" Stiles yells again. He's well aware that his voice is bordering on hysterics and can already feel the familiar feeling of tears leaking from his eyes. "What the hell are you doing? Stop it!"

"I can't Stiles."

"Of course you can," Stiles protests. He tries to drag himself up but even with Lydia's help all he can achieve is a stumble to his knees. "He's a freakin' nogitsune. A murderer. He killed Allison," he feels more frustrated tears sting his eyes. "He kept me trapped in my own head, Scott."

"I know," Scott says weakly, still pumping on the downed body's chest.

"Then why?" Stiles yells in confused anger, a sudden surprise sob escaping him. Lydia tries to shush him and with Kira's help she actually succeeds in getting him to his feet and turning him away.

"I can smell him," he hears Scott tell him brokenly, a flicker of regret and conflict there. "He's _human_, Stiles. I can't let him die."

* * *

He comes to in a rush of violent, flailing arms.

It's such an alien feeling. He's always been in control of his body and it's strange to be so fluid and _not_.

"Easy," a warm and rich voice says from above.

He's being held down easily, despite the flailing, and he's ashamed to say he has to resort to biting to try and get the upper hand. He ends up gnashing with bared teeth but his head is easily rolled away with a set of firm hands.

The alpha, Scott, looms above him and brackets him into place and the owner of the voice stands off to the side, holding down his errant arms.

The veterinarian his mind supplies.

The emissary who stuck him full of wolf lichen.

Poisoned.

"Get off me," he tries to warn but he realises with a little disorientation that there's nothing in him anymore. His voice isn't like it was before. Deeper and foreboding.

"What did you do to me?" he asks and no one answers so he thrashes more against their hands, spitting and snapping his teeth at them.

"Cut it out," Scott hisses down at him angrily. He squeezes a little too tight and he sucks in a breath of pain. He's never felt that before, not even when he's ripping his stomach open, and surprised tears slide out of the side of his eyes. "We're trying to save you."

"Why?" he chokes out.

Scott doesn't answer. He doesn't lessen up on the pressure either.

"Scott?" Deaton says and he darts his eyes to his right to see Deaton nodding down at where he lays. "A little less pressure."

Scott nods reluctantly and to his surprise they both back off, stepping away from his body.

Obviously they both think he's not much of a danger to them but he can't fight his way up off the cold metal table he's lying on to show them anything different. He practices his breaths, deep in and out, and hopes he's perfected the snarl across his face that would have been completely out of place on the Stilinski boy.

Instead Scott steps away again enabling Deaton to step closer. He jumps in surprise when he feels another pin prick on the inside of his elbow and he hisses angrily, tugging his arm away and cradling it against his chest.

There's no words of comfort and he's glad because all he'd want is to rip their tongues out and spray the room with their blood.

Scott simply looks at him with a cold and unreadable stare.

He feels whatever it is they gave him spread throughout his veins. It warms his body and pulls him under. He folds his body against it, curling into his side, and presses his face against the table.

He doesn't like it.

This _feeling_.

Weak.

Pathetic.

Utterly human.

* * *

He's in a world of pain when he wakes up.

His ribs and chest constrict hard and he has no idea why.

There's murmuring from the next room, he can't make much out, but he's picked up on the fact that Lydia's left, inconsolable and gone to be with Ethan in their misery together.

It's a shame about Aidan.

He'd never actually been part of the plan, but he'd been there at the wrong place and the wrong time, right on the end of one of the oni's swords. He hadn't known at the time. In fact it was only now, hearing little pieces here and there, that he'd put the broken words together.

He did actually like the twins. They weren't like the others, or the incessant chatter and need to be better than the one who rode his skin that always permeated from Stiles inner monologues, but then things had shifted. He didn't understand Ethan's desire to be part of the pack.

It was their downfall really.

In the end, ironically, it had been Aidan who'd made the decision.

He'd been willing to kill for the new alpha.

He also, it seems, had been willing to die for him too.

It was sickening really.

He rolls on to his opposite side, unable to stretch out his aching torso, breaths catching with the roll of bones and realises he's not alone anymore.

Stiles is in the doorway.

He wonders if he looks as bad as the Stilinski boy.

His face is too pale against the red plaid of his shirt. There's deep purple bruising around his eyes. A hand trembles as it braces the doorframe.

_weak_

_pathetic _

_human_

the words are on his lips. He wants to remind him of this. Remind him of the things in his head.

He manages to get his head off the cold examination table and curl further, chin lifting in defiance as they spill out in a faint whisper. He feels the sneer and upturn of his lip as he does so.

Stiles eyes widen and he takes halting step backwards, stumbling in the doorway.

He drops back down into his curled position, grin forming on his face, satisfied.

_This was all he's doing._

And then sheriff was there, appearing from the backroom and wrapping an arm around his son.

He's not sure where this sudden hatred (more than usual anyway) for Stiles comes from when he sees this gesture, but all he knows is that there's a clouding confusion and a deep, strange and unfamiliar sensation swirl deep within him when sees the boy embraced in the older man's arm.

He had caused mayhem and chaos at both the sheriff's station and the hospital. _Chaos_, _strife_, and _pain_. Murder. People died. And yet, here the Sheriff was, still finding time for his son.

He sneers again, sighing loudly, before turning away from them.

"C'mon kiddo, lets get you home…" he hears the Sheriff murmur and then more quietly, barely audible but still loud against his ears. "He can't hurt you anymore."

* * *

Scott appears in front of him not long after Stiles and the Sheriff leave and heaves him into a sitting position. His ribs protest the sudden movement but neither he nor Scott acknowledge it.

"Here," Scott says, dropping a hoodie into his lap. "Put this on."

He doesn't like being ordered around.

No one has ever _dared_ to command him into doing anything before, but he's grateful for the added warmth the heavy material would no doubt give him, and gladly accepts it.

His fingers fumble with the top, no matter how much he tries, and in the end Scott sighs heavily before snatching it out of his grasp.

"Rude…" he mumbles to himself. Scott freezes with the words and he tilts his head questionably. "What?"

"You sounded like Stiles," Scott says before roughly pushing the top over his head with more aggression than was necessary. "Stop it."

He has no problem with stopping.

He doesn't want to be like Stiles at all.

He might wear his face and bare his skin but he's nothing like him.

"What happened?" he asks when Scott continues to help his strangely uncoordinated body into all the obligatory holes. "Why does my chest feel like an elephant sat on it?" Scott doesn't answer. "Am I a werewolf?"

He remembers Stiles last words to him.

"_You can't be a wolf and a fox."_

"No," Scott says once he's straightened the top out.

"But I'm not a nogitsune either."

"No."

"And I'm not dead either."

"No," Scott says, rubbing his eyes tiredly.

"Why?" he asks. He has a right to know.

"Can you stop with the twenty questions already," Scott snaps at him before tugging him off the table and towards the door. He takes only two steps before his legs give out on him but Scott steps right into his side and levers him back up. "Don't even think about it," he warns, arm wrapping around his waist. "Deaton doesn't want you here and I'm running out of places."

"Way to make someone feel wanted…" he mutters to himself.

He instantly realises that he's sounding like Stiles again and he bites down on his lip both in anger at himself and in hope that he doesn't anger Scott any further. Even he, in this current state, knew it was not in his favour to piss off an alpha anymore then he has done already.

He feels Scott's tension against his side and by the time that they're outside he can see part of the reason. Stiles is still there with his dad, levelling a hurt look at Scott. It doesn't take a genius to figure out he's the reason.

He wants to smile at this, at the realisation that somehow he's got between the alpha and the human boy, and he may actually be doing it. He's not sure though. He can't feel any movement on his face though because he's distracted by the fact that Hale is there too.

He's got his hand on Stiles shoulder and is murmuring something down to the boy. He can't hear it, despite the deep concentration and straining he's trying to muster, but whatever is being said has Stiles nodding, offering a weak smile in response before wilting further into his father's side.

_weak_

_pathetic_

_human_

"Stop looking at them," Scott says once he's noticed him staring. "You don't get to look at Stiles again. Ever."

"Okay. Whatever," he grumbles, stumbling against a grey SUV. "So if no one wants me around where the hell are you taking me?"

"My place," Derek says, suddenly appearing at the side of the SUV.

He takes him by surprise, causing him to jump a little. Just enough for his wobbly legs to shake and his knee's to lock. Derek reaches out with a steadying hand and he flinches away from it, offering a hard stare back instead.

"Get in," Derek says when the staring drags into an uncomfortable silence, opening the back door.

Again with the ordering and commands.

He glares at both of them before gingerly climbing his crumbling body in the back of the car.

* * *

He loses time in car and awakens disoriented and confused.

All he knows is somewhere between the cold compress of the car window and the couch someone must have dragged or carried his completely out of it body into the loft.

He's drifting, in and out of consciousness, and wonders if they've sedated him again.

There's thoughts of Stiles in his head. Of _itchy_ and _pained_ skin and _cold metal_ in his hands.

Someone shakes him awake and tells him he needs to change, that he can't sleep in the clothes he's been wearing (he wore them for death, he can wear them to sleep) but he can barely keep his eyes open, let alone coordinate himself into the soft garments being pushed into his hands.

He grunts, tongue rolling in his mouth, blinking his eyes open and seeing Stiles in the far corner of the room, tears on his face, a flash of metal in his hands and the distant sound of yelling in his head.

Then Derek's face is in front of him and Stiles is gone.

"Hey," Derek says, hand catching his chin and stilling his head. "Are you with me?"

He nods, or tries to, but as soon as Derek lets go his head lolls to the side like all his strings had been cut.

Derek sighs and then he's feeling his pants being tugged off – and he hears Stiles voice in his head, something along the lines of _how very forward of you_, but he's too spent to find the words and doesn't think Hale would appreciate it, not when it's not _his_ Stiles saying it – and then something soft is being rolled into place.

"You can't stay here," Derek is telling him before pulling his boneless body off the couch. For a wild moment he thinks he means here, at the loft, and he can't help but dig a hand into the arm holding him up, a flare of panic emerging from somewhere.

But instead of being thrown out of the door he's being helped up a spiral staircase and lowered into a soft bed.

It's strange, is all he can think as sleep pulls him once again.

The strangest thing. Even for a nogitsune.

* * *

When he awakens for the second time since arriving at the loft he hears soft voices from below.

He pulls himself out of the bed, still feeling a flare and catch in his chest, but is thankful that he can keep himself upright.

He feels calmer.

He's more in control of his body.

He heads to the spiral staircase but stops when he hears the voices clearer. Something about _Stiles_ and _taking a cheese grater to his face_.

He ends up sitting at the top of the stairs, wondering if the two werewolves realise he's awake – he's always had a slow and steady heart rate compared to Stiles rabbit-like speed – and presses his bare feet against the cold metal beneath him.

He should feel satisfied.

He would have once.

This is something he and his little flies would have done.

Instead he feels numb. And he can't fathom why.

"You should have seen him, Derek…" he hears Scott say, voice bordering on tortured. "We managed to get it away before he did too much damage to his face, but he tore up his arms pretty good. I had to get mom to come and see him. When I asked why he did it all he would say is that he wanted out of his skin. That he didn't want to be like him."

"He'll be okay…" Derek says in encouragement. He closes his eyes and presses it against the staircase wondering who he actually meant. Stiles? Both of them? "He just needs some time."

"The Sheriff's having to take some time off," he hears Scott murmur, "He doesn't think Stiles should be alone right now. It's not really the best time, is it? Not after everything that's just happened," he sounds bitter and angry and he knows it's directed at him. "We've tried to convince him that he won't be alone but I guess he thinks he needs his dad right now."

"It's not really surprising," Derek replies. "Besides, Stiles probably _does_ need his dad right now. He looked so young last night. Christ… you're all still kids."

He hears Scott protest lightly and there's more murmuring. He waits until he hears Scott leave before heading back down the stairs.

"What happened to Stiles?" he asks quietly.

"Do you care?" Derek asks, head stuck in a book.

He shrugs and scuffs his foot across the floor.

"Can I leave?"

"No," was Derek's only reply.

"Why not?"

Derek doesn't reply so he ends up attempting to stride across the room, it's more of a shuffle really, but he eventually gets to the loft door.

It refuses to open.

"Open the door," he orders, tugging at it again. He turns and glares at him again. "Open the damn door."

"Sit down," Derek orders instead.

"Let me out!" he yells in frustration, slamming a fist against the loft door.

"What? You don't like it?" Derek asks, voice mocking him. "Being trapped? Being told what to do? You're not pulling the strings anymore. How do you like that?"

"Shut up," he says, voice cracking with pressure.

"You'll be arrested straight away," Derek says, scrutinising him. He finally puts the book down and steps up and away from the couch, towards him.

"I don't care!" he challenges him. "They'll think it's Stiles anyway."

"I'll make sure it's you that gets thrown in jail. Not Stiles," Derek suddenly rounds on him, breathing angry fire down on him. He grabs at his face and squeezes. "You'll be tried as an adult. Do you know what they do to the pretty ones?"

"Get off me," he pushes away, more weakly then before.

"You'll last five minutes if you try and run," Derek follows him, grabbing at his arm. He stumbles again and he's not completely sure if Derek holding him is from anger or to stop him from falling. "And then you'll be back with your tail between your legs begging us for help like the pathetic being you truly are."

_weak_

_pathetic_

_human_

"Get off me," he tries again, it comes out more like a wheeze and then Derek is shoving him down on the couch. "What the hell is happening to me?"

"What did Scott tell you?" Derek asks gruffly.

"Nothing. Except that I'm not a werewolf. Or a nogitsune. And I'm not dead either. How is that even possible?"

"I don't know," Derek concedes before sitting down on the coffee table in front of him. "You started to heal after Kira stabbed you but then the fly fled."

"So why am I not a werewolf?" he asks, rubbing at the burning feeling being pressed against his chest.

"We don't know yet, all we know is that the bite didn't take but the nogitsune felt threatened enough to flee. Whatever happened left you behind."

"Well that explains a lot," he huffs out.

"It's the only one I've got."

"And my chest?" he asks, rubbing at it more, hunching in on himself. He knows he sounds whiny but he can't help himself. "It really hurts."

"Compressions. CPR. Scott saved your life."

"Why?" he asks, bewildered, searching Derek's face for answers. "Why would he do that?"

"Because he has a hero complex," Derek shrugs. "Because, apparently, he tries to see the good in everyone."

"Really? 'Cause I got the distinct impression that there was a lot of hostility."

"Do you blame him?" Derek's voice hardens once again.

He refuses to answer and looks away, only realising a few seconds later, that it was the same corner of the room he'd thought he'd seen an apparition of Stiles the night before.

"C'mon…" Derek says, surprising him with an abrupt tug off the couch. "You need to eat."

"I don't need anything," he quietly says. It isn't something that he normally has to worry about. Food and drink. He lasted until he moved along. Until he was reborn again.

"Deaton said you were dehydrated and malnourished," Derek says, leading him into the kitchen. "He had to give you IV fluids."

He realises, only now, that there's bruising to one of his arms.

"You're blood pressure and sugar levels were way too low," he says, pushing him down into a seat at the counter. "You're going to have to learn about these things if you want to survive."

"Maybe I don't," he admits, shaking Derek's arm off. "Maybe Scott should have let me die."

Derek only slides an already made sandwich and a glass of orange juice in front of him in response.

* * *

There's radio silence for the next few days. Derek disappears intermittently. The door is always locked.

He doesn't really care that much and he takes to the couch or bed, submerging himself into the covers and waiting for the inevitable to happen. He wonders, pitifully, if Stiles feels like this. Like an intruder in his own skin. If what he'd overheard Scott say was remotely true then it was highly likely.

It's on the third afternoon, if the sun on his face is any indicator, that he dreams about Stiles again.

This time he's at a party.

His dad's there too although he doesn't look like he belongs there. It's so surreal and out of place that he wonders if it's a dream within a dream.

Stiles dream.

The Sheriff is yelling at a kid for asking him why he's wearing black and slurring something about funerals, a bottle of Jack firmly in his hand, until he spots him. Stiles.

He spits out insults one after another.

_It's all you_

_You killed her_

_And now you're killing me_

He wakes before the bottle smashes against the frame and all he can grasp is one feeling amongst the wildly beating heart.

He feels bereft.

* * *

Derek still hasn't returned when night rolls around and for once the door isn't locked. Maybe it's a test. Maybe he doesn't think he's a flight risk anymore, whatever the reason he knows he needs out. And for the first time since awakening in Deaton's clinic he knows where he needs to go.

He finds the Sheriff's house easy enough, retracing his steps, and sees that both the police cruiser and jeep were present. He has no plans to knock on the door and announce his presence and recalls a memory that was not his own, picking the lock to the back door easily.

Inside he sees the Sheriff asleep on the couch, the television emitting a warm glow. There's no sign of Stiles, the main lights are off upstairs, but there's a small light being emitted from somewhere, and he presumes he's upstairs asleep.

He finds himself in the hall, drawn to a picture of a woman smiling. There's another one with Stiles. The third one has all three; the woman, Stiles, and the Sheriff. Stiles can be no older than six years old, being crushed by his father. _Cherished_.

He picks it up and traces his fingers over the glass.

And then it hits him all at once.

He wants _this_.

He doesn't know where it comes from but he feels the wetness on his face.

"Stiles?"

He startles, the picture falling from his grasp, glass cracking as it hits the ground.

"Kiddo? Are you okay?" the Sheriff asks, taking a step towards him.

"I'm not Stiles," he automatically says.

The Sheriff freezes, eyes widening in alarm.

"I mean," he quickly clarifies, not really sure why he's trying to appease the man. "I'm the other one."

"What are you doing here?" he demands, anger flashing across his face.

"I don't really know," he admits, shaking his head, gesturing a feeble hand towards him. "I just needed to…"

"Dad?" Stiles calls in a sleepy voice. There's a thunder of steps that abruptly still on the staircase. "What's going…"

"Stay where you are, Stiles," The Sheriff demands, concern evident in his tone.

"Don't hurt him," Stiles pleads, voice begging.

"I'm not going to," he says, shaking his head again, taking a hesitant step towards the Sheriff. His voice is cracking and breaking. "I can't… I just need to…"

"_Please_…" Stiles own voice cracks and he turns to see the contorted look on his mirror image. There's a small patch of gauze on his left cheek. He should be satisfied that he's making Stiles look this distressed. But he's not. He's _not_.

"Please…" he puts his hand out trying to placate them and then tucks them back, looks down at them in surprise, the trembling evident across his long fingers, remembering the last time he'd made the gesture, given false promises. "I can't explain… I…"

He can't explain it.

And then he's in a fit of tears that is even harder to explain.

Someone hesitatingly pushes him into the lounge and the door is shut on him.

He sits on the floor with his back pushed to the edge of a recliner seat, knees tucked up to his chest.

Sometime later the door is cracked open quietly and Stiles is there in doorway again, staring at him.

It's always the doors.

He gets it now.

_Okay, he fucking gets it already._

* * *

"What the hell were you thinking?" Derek demands, hands tight on the steering wheel.

"I don't know."

"What the hell were you trying to achieve?"

"I _don't_ know."

"You don't know, huh?" Derek shakes his head angrily. He's sat in the passenger seat, knees still tucked up against his chest. "You broke into their house. You scared the shit out of them. Do you even know how fragile Stiles is right now?"

_I can imagine_, he thinks, but instead he just shrugs.

"So? What the hell did you want?" Derek demands again, banging the wheel.

"I dreamt about Stiles' dad, okay!" he finally snaps. "And I felt like I needed to go there. Scott brought me back and now I have these fucking feelings and I don't know what I'm supposed to do with them and-…"

"Feelings?"

"… is that what he wanted? Keep me alive like _this_?" he gestures at himself. "Instead of killing me, huh? Torture me with memories? With thoughts? With fucking feelings? Because guess what assholes; it's working."

"I don't think that was what he intended," Derek says with a softer voice then he had been expecting.

"Scott brought me back and where the fuck is he then?" he suddenly finds himself yelling, legs coming out to kick at the SUV's dashboard. "Where the fuck is he?"

"Hey," Derek objects, hand catching one of his legs. "Cut it out."

"Stop the car," he orders, hand already on the handle.

"We're nowhere near the loft," Derek tells him, ignoring his request.

He goes for the handle anyway, fully aware there was a high chance he'd end up under the wheels, and ends up halfway out before a startled hand finds its way to the back of his hoodie.

"What the fuck," Derek growls, car swerving dangerously. "Stop it."

"Stop the fucking or I swear I'm throwing myself out," he promises, wildly resisting Derek's tug.

"Okay, okay," Derek says and he feels the car start to slow. "I'm pulling over."

He's out of the open door before the car even comes to a stop, running as fast as his protesting ribs will allow. Running faster than he's ever run before.

Derek catches up to him easily and then they're both tumbling to the ground. He shrieks a little in pain, Derek rolling him over, straddling him, before panting up at the older man. "I'm a bad person," he says finally, the words painfully slipping out between them. "Is that what you all wanted me say?"

He feels more tears come and there's just enough room for him to turn his face away into the dirt beneath him. "I'm a bad person."

* * *

He sleeps more.

More than what is supposed to be normal by the way Derek is reacting.

He stays in more.

He tries to get him to eat more.

He actually tries to spoon feed him some watery and gloopy soup that only sits unsettled on his stomach.

He hears him on the phone with someone.

It's only after he leaves, with a grumble of '_gatorade'_ '_crackers'_ and _'something he can keep down…'_ and wondering when the hell he brought anything _up_, that he realises Derek sounds worried.

It's sometime while he's waiting for Derek to return that he feels a churn in his stomach, an unpleasant sensation that has him bolting off the couch and into the bathroom, emptying the meagre contents into the toilet. He barely makes it in time, falling to his knees in front of the porcelain, retching violently.

This, too, is all new to him.

Of course, he'd vomited Stiles out in a mound of gooey bandages, but he'd known what was coming. He'd planned it. Controlled it.

This was decisively un-supernatural, and uncontrolled, his body rebelling in a spectacular manner.

He's retching violently again, sobbing actually, when he hears a snick of the loft door being pulled open. A shuffle of feet a minute or so later and then a hesitant hand on his shoulder.

He sags then, thinking it was Derek returning, and one hand is replaced by two, firmly keeping him upright.

It's not until he's finished retching, panting and sweating crazily that he realises the fuzzy shape in front of him is not Derek in any shape or form.

A cool glass of water is pushed into his hand and a soft request to drink comes soon after.

"What are you doing here?" he asks, confused, light headed.

"I saw this," Stiles says, leaning back onto his haunches. He finally sighs tiredly and sits back against the wall. "You being sick. I can hear you in my head."

"I dream about you," he says.

"I know."

"I wasn't going to hurt your dad," he says. Not that time. Not now. He's not sure any of it matters now.

"I know," Stiles says again. He picks at a loose thread on the hem of his sleeve. "I'm me and you're you. There's no we anymore."

"I don't even have a name," he says, feeling another break of sweat across his forehead. Stiles shape blurs in front of him. He wasn't even sure if he was there or not. Maybe he's talking to another apparition again.

"Void. Nogitsune. Dark spirit," Stiles offers and there's the faint humor, the sarcasm, that he knows was always there. "That's what you are, right?"

"You can't call me that," he protests weakly, head lolling against the cool tiles. "They're not names."

"They're what I know you as."

"Give me a name," he asks. He feels like he's fading, drifting away, with no identity to keep him rooted.

"You can't ask me that," apparition Stiles demands angrily but he makes no move to disappear. "Ask Scott. He's the one who brought you back."

There's still traces of hurt to the voice.

"He won't come and see me," he admits, voice thick in his throat. Sweat trickles down his back. "Does that make you feel better?"

It should.

They've both been rejected in different ways.

"No," he mutters back. "What was the point?"

They're interrupted by the bathroom door swinging open and Derek's eyes widen in surprise when he sees the two of them.

"What the hell are you doing here?" he asks.

"I've been dreaming about him," apparition Stiles admits with a vague gesture. Like it's just another _thing_. "You weren't here and he was sick."

"Get up," Derek snaps, annoyed, grabbing apparition Stiles and heaving him up off the floor.

"I'm sorry," apparition Stiles stutters as he's dragged from the room, the words touching his own lips but never quite falling.

Some minutes pass before he finds enough energy to drag himself upright and hang off the doorframe. Derek's sat opposite him and he now realises that this isn't an apparition, this is the real Stiles. There's a raised red graze to his cheek but he can already see it's starting to heal.

"I don't want you coming here on your own," Derek is telling him. "Not without Scott or when I'm not here. Got it."

Derek is squeezing his shoulder again and Stiles is nodding and it seems rude to interrupt but he'd never been fond of niceties.

"Fuck," he mutters as the room spins and darkens, his body falling heavy soon afterwards.

* * *

He spends another week in bed.

Wet cloths are placed on heads.

Foreheads are actually felt.

Deaton makes home visits with a wary Melissa McCall.

More fluids are given.

Antibiotics are administered.

His skin is touched and words are murmured.

He feels wretched and alive all at once.

* * *

The first day he feels well enough to get out of bed is the first day towards his redemption.

Derek is fast asleep in his own bed on the far side of the loft.

He sits and watches the TV, aimlessly flickering through the channels until he comes across the local news. The date and time stamp sits heavy on him. It's the night it all changed. They're interviewing a victim's daughter, in light of the recent knowledge that due to another power surge conveniently occurring at the same time as the 'incident' (although, he's sure this more to do with the Sheriff's and Stiles' friends protection than any 'coincidence') the hospital CCTV had not been working and they had no workable identification on anyone except for men in masks and one solitary figure. The daughter cries openly, telling the camera, _him_, how she'll never forgive him. She'll never forget. That he took the one person who meant everything to her.

He stares at the screen for a long time, pauses it on her distraught face, and slides to his knees as his own tears fall.

He can't bare the feeling.

_Guilt_.

He knows what it is. He'd felt it enough times when Stiles had screamed at it him to stop. To stop hurting the ones he loved.

He'd killed people.

He'd had people killed.

The deputy.

All those people at the hospital.

_Allison_

That woman's father who he didn't know. Whose face taunted him now?

He'd hungered for it.

He had needed it.

And the fox had fled and left him just a shell. He'd left nothing behind apart from _chaos_ and _strife_ and _pain_.

Derek finds him like that, sobbing on the floor, clutching the remote to his chest and murmuring "I'm sorry" over and over.


End file.
